Kiss'Em Goodbye

Seattle Mariners

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Kiss 'Em Goodbye is a series focusing on MLB teams as their postseason dreams fade—whether in September (or before), the League Division Series, League Championship Series or World Series. It combines a broad overview from Baseball Prospectus, a front-office take from former MLB GM Jim Bowden, a best- and worst-case scenario ZiPS projection for 2012 from Dan Szymborski and Kevin Goldstein's farm system overview.

Today the ship sails for the Seattle Mariners, who despite boasting 2010 AL Cy Young Award winner Felix Hernandez and young fireballer Michael Pineda in their rotation, still managed to underachieve because of a paltry offense. It's time to kiss 'em goodbye.

Baseball Prospectus' Take
Projected 2012 Lineup
There's a reason why the Mariners produced so little offensively—they lacked the thump most of the American League almost takes for granted. With Ichiro seemingly on the downside of his career, the Mariners need someone to pick up the slack. Chone Figgins is still under contract for two more seasons, but his days as a regular in Seattle appear over.

Signs of hope: The Mariners debuted two blue-chip prospects who have quickly lived up to their billing. Michael Pineda, a 22-year-old right-hander, broke camp with the big club and has been one of the better starters in the league. He's taken 27 turns and posted a 3.72 ERA while ranking second in the league in strikeout rate at 9.2 per nine. Thanks to his ability to miss bats and some outstanding defensive support (.256 BABIP), he has surrendered fewer hits per nine than any American League starter other than Justin Verlander and Josh Beckett. In mid-June, 2009 first-round pick Dustin Ackley came up and provided some immediate offensive punch; his .290/.367/.453 line—good for a .323 true average—leads Mariner regulars in all three slash categories.

Signs of disaster: The Mariners' offense is far and away the league's worst; their 3.42 runs per game is a full run lower than the rest of the league. They've gotten lousy work from youngsters (Justin Smoak is hitting .232/.318/.397), once-promising building blocks (Franklin Gutierrez is hitting .224/.261/.273 after battling more stomach woes, while Michael Saunders is at .162/.221/.239), pricey free agents (Chone Figgins has sunk to .188/.241/.243), and superstars (Ichiro Suzuki's at a career-worst .275/.313/.339). When Mike Carp (.274/.333/.465) is your second-best hitter, you need to go back to the drawing board—and burn it down.

Signs you can ignore: Unless Ichiro collects 32 hits over his final 16 games, his string of 10 consecutive 200-hit seasons will come to an end. As impressive as that streak has been—it's a key component of his Hall of Fame case—it seems clear that there's a link between the increasingly slappy 37-year-old's poor season and the fact he has played in all but one game. The team needs to rest him more often so as to deploy him more judiciously, instead of letting him chase individual milestones. —Jay Jaffe, Baseball Prospectus

Bowden's Bold Move
The Mariners began the offseason by extending the contract of general manager Jack Zduriencik through the 2013 season. Zduriencik, 60, has been on the job three years, and when he arrived his plan was to build the organization through player development and scouting, and that's exactly what he's done. This year's first-round draft choice, Danny Hultzen, could join Hernandez and Pineda in the third spot in their rotation as early as 2012. Brandon League, acquired in the Brandon Morrow deal, has developed into a dominant closer. Second baseman Dustin Ackley, the No. 2 overall pick in the 2009 draft, has quickly shown he's as good as advertised with the bat and someday could be as impactful as Chase Utley has been in his career with the Phillies.

Despite Ackley's emergence, the Mariners' offseason needs are clear: they need some offense. After the 2010 trade deadline deal in which they acquired Justin Smoak from the Rangers for Cliff Lee and this year's emergence of Mike Carp, most baseball people don't think the M's will be chasing an impact free-agent bat like Prince Fielder. Not so fast. Zduriencik drafted Fielder in Milwaukee and would love for him to be the Mariners' new cleanup hitter for years to come. Zduriencik also has a good relationship with Fielder's agent, Scott Boras. Realistically, Smoak is a five-hole hitter and Carp a six-hole hitter in a championship lineup. If you get a chance to get Fielder, you get him. The M's can trade Smoak in a package to the Indians for right fielder Shin-Soo Choo, who originally was signed by the Mariners in 2000. The Indians are convinced Carlos Santana will end up at catcher and Matt LaPorta is no longer their answer at first. Smoak would solve first base for the Indians for the long term while reducing financial exposure. This would give the Mariners a middle-of-the-order lineup consisting of Ackley, Fielder, and Choo, which would be a huge offensive upgrade and give their top-flight young starting rotation the run support needed to compete in 2012. —Jim Bowden

Hopes and Fears
Best-case scenario ZiPS projection: 84-78
The Mariners have a good starting rotation headed by King Felix, Michael Pineda and an adequate supporting cast, but there's just not enough offense in the organization to move the M's to even the middle of the pack in scoring. Even assuming Justin Smoak improves, Dustin Ackley continues to play at 2011 levels and Ichiro bounces back a little bit, the Mariners aren't going to even get their scoring to league average. Pineda's got enough talent to become a true ace very soon, but even a dominant one-two punch in the rotation won't be able to paper over enough offensive holes to have much of a shot at the playoffs.

Worst-case scenario: 63-99
With the Mariners' offense destined to be below average no matter what, a little bad luck with the pitching—the 2011 Mariners have actually been very fortunate with the health of their staff—will leave the Mariners a lock to get a top-five pick in the 2013 draft. The Mariners got 237 innings of solid pitching from Doug Fister and Erik Bedard in 37 starts, which they now have to replace just to stay where they are. Charlie Furbush, Blake Beavan, and James Paxton all have futures in Seattle, but they're not ready to make up for the losses of Fister and Bedard in 2012.—Dan Szymborski, Baseball Think Factory

Organizational Future
There isn't much immediate help on the way in Seattle, but that should be understandable considering the team "graduated" one of the best young hitters and young pitchers this year in Ackley and Pineda. Throw in young, developing sluggers Smoak and Carp and a still very young King Felix, and this is a team on the rise, but there is going to be a gap before the next wave of talent arrives. The most intriguing part of the system comes from high-ceiling pitchers, as 2010 draftees Taijuan Walker and James Paxton had some of the best stuff in the Midwest League this year. Southpaw Paxton accelerated his timetable with a strong showing at Double-A at the end of the year.—Kevin Goldstein, Baseball Prospectus

I hope replying to myself isn't the 21st century equivalent to walking around mumbling incoherently to myself.... anyway, the Mariners are not close. Not close at all. They do not need to pursue a bad-bodied first baseman whose contract will be an albatross by the time the club is ready to be competitive again.

Keep playing the kids, see what you have in Carp and Smoak at DH/1B. Zduriencik was able to get out from under his mistake acquisition of Cliff Lee in 2010, but he isn't going to be able to unload Prince Fielder when he realizes how far away his club is from contending, likely about three weeks into the 2012 season.

The problem with "playing the kids" is that right now the kids are producing some of the worst offensive performances we've seen in 40 years.

At some point the Mariners have to wade into the free agent market for someone who can actually hit. The system as it stands isn't producing much power (in the same way the Mariners system 10 years ago was incapable of producing a starting pitcher that wasn't fragile).

Ultimately, I don't think Lincoln and Armstrong will outlay the money necessary to get Fielder, and they'll do what they can to blame Ichiro's $17M due in 2012 for not doing so, which will just whip the mouthbreathing sports talk listeners into another fury... awesome.

This isn't a team, much less a system, that can contend consistently. It's a long way from the disaster Bill Bavasi left behind, but it's still a long way from even where the Pirates are right now.

"The M's can trade Smoak in a package to the Indians for right fielder Shin-Soo Choo."

Bowden make it sound so delusionally easy, like all Zduriencik needs to do is pick up the phone and tell Chris Antonetti "I want Shin-Soo Choo" and Antonetti will say "Sure! Anything for you, Jack!" Why would the Indians trade Choo? And since when are they convinced Santana is their long-term catcher? Everything I have heard totally contradicts that.

I think I have Bowden figured out. He can only spell the word 'R-E-B-U-I-L-D' in the most obvious of cases (Cubs, Astros). But then, as wnalyd up there shows, real-life human GMs never really get the chance to rebuild. The vast bulk of the fans get impatient, such that if you don't have them winning by 'Year 3', you get axed, and your successor reaps the benefits while looking great record-wise in comparison to you. Bowden is advising GMs rather than franchises, and doing so pretty rationally.

Looking at it that way, yeah, Jack Z should try his darnedest to sign Fielder. If the Mariners don't compete for a playoff spot next year, he's very likely gone.

I think the extension Zduriencik was given indicates that ownership is on board with the continued rebuilding effort. If they were in win-now mode for 2012, I don't think Jack Z. would have received more than one year.

Why is Jason Vargas not in the rotation? He's still under team control for another couple years.
The obvious move for next year is to trade bulk from overstock (hacking outfielders with plus power, back end rotation candidates) to get one star level hitter. They've got room in a number of places - 3B, LF, DH.

You seldom extend a guy for 1 year. Just doesn't quiet any rumors, which is the purpose of this type of extension. Since I don't see the Mariners contending next season, I expect Jack Z. will be gone by October of next year.

I fear Smoak may not be much more than what he is so far.
We have this feeling he will suddenly blossom but that hope has surrounded Chris Davis for years, just to name one. And Davis DID have an impressive rookie year at least.

On the whole though I think Z-Man is on the right track by at least trying out his assortment of OF's/1B's to see what
sticks. Ichiro is the obvious aging elephant in the room.

I don't agree with some of the gloom and doom talk here. The Mariners are on the verge of having an incredible starting rotation if Walker and Hultzen are as good as advertised. They won't need much offense to win with that rotation.